St. Simons Island (AP) – A community on the Georgia coast is donating artifacts, remembrances and dollars to launch a museum dedicated to how World War II reshaped local lives on the home front.

The Coastal Georgia Historical Society plans to open the World War II Home Front Museum next year on St. Simons Island. The museum will tell the story of coastal Glynn County’s role in building ships to carry troops and supplies overseas, training Navy officers to operate radar in battle, and watching for German submarines that lurked off the Georgia coast.

Mimi Rogers is the historical society’s museum curator. She says roughly 2,000 photographs have been collected and about 45 people have given interviews detailing their wartime memories.

The society has raised most of the $3.3 million needed to fund the museum.